The Kremlin’s Virtual Army -- Foreign Policy
Shadowy hackers in Moscow and St. Petersburg? Old news. Get ready for the next generation of Russian cyberwarriors.
It started as a fairly predictable digital conflict, mimicking the one in the real world and displaying no shortage of “conventional” cyberwarfare: Web pages were attacked, comments were erased, and photos were vandalized. A typical prank on the Georgian Foreign Ministry’s Web site visually compared Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili with Adolf Hitler.
As Russian tanks lumbered southward over mountainous Ossetian terrain, Russian netizens were seeking to dominate the digital battlefield.
But sophomoric pranks and cyberattacks were only the first shots of a much wider online war in which Russian bloggers willingly enlisted as the Kremlin’s grass-roots army. For Russian netizens, “unconventional” cyberwarfare—winning the hearts and minds of the West—became more important than crashing another server in Tbilisi. Managing information seemed all the more urgent as there were virtually no images from the first and the most controversial element in the whole war—the Georgian invasion of Tskhinvali, the capital of South Ossetia—and the destruction that, were one to believe the Kremlin’s account, followed shortly thereafter.
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More On The Future Of Cyberwar
Misunderstanding Cyberwar in Georgia -- Reuters
'How I Joined Russia's Cyber War' -- Wired Magazine
Longtime Battle Lines Are Recast In Russia and Georgia's Cyberwar -- Washington Post
The Russia Georgia cyberwar -- Internet News
In a First, Cyberwar and Real War Collide in Georgia -- Enterprise Security Today
Cyberwar and real war collide in Georgia -- International Herald Tribune
Anatomy of a cyberwar in Georgia -- Christian Science Monitor
THE WRAP: The Georgian cyberwar -- Telecomasia
My Comment: When the war started I tried my best to find Russian and Georgian websites that will cover the war from their different perspectives. I had no problem finding Russian websites, but a number of Georgian websites were down. It was only until Monday that I was able to compile a list of Georgian websites.
Information .... or the control of information .... is a tool that governments have used since the concept of war first started in ancient times. The internet changes these ground rules by now providing numerous points for information to be transmitted and received. While Georgia's main news and government sites were hacked, others quickly replaced them offering the same information. Bloggers, Myspace and Facebook accounts, in short an "Army of Davids" were unleashed that could not be stopped by any large group or organization.
For a country who wishes to successfully pursue a cyberwar, it has to adopt one of three strategies. (1) Use the web to provide disinformation. I fell into this trap by posting a story that American soldiers may have been either killed or captured by Russian soldiers when the war first started. The story came from the Russian news website Izvestia and it created a viral storm on a number of blogs .... even Rush Limbaugh had to address this on his radio program (on Friday) when a caller brought it up. Truth be told .... NO American soldiers have been captured or killed. (2) Use the web to address disinformation or propaganda. In my case, when it was obvious that there were no American soldiers captured or killed .... I pointed this out when the Russian website Pravda tried to run with the same story a few days later. (3) To be 100% successful in a cyberwar, you must physically cripple and/or destroy the hard assets and communication infrastructure that your opponent's web services are dependent on. Targeting web sites themselves will only provide a short term victory .... another website from another web address will quickly replace the one that is being incapacitated.
In the Russian Georgian war .... I found that the Georgian websites were back online within two days. I am sure that in a future war, from the experience that many have gained from last weeks war (including this person), this lag time will be down to only a few hours. How can you win a cyber war when your enemy is back into the fight a few hours later?
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